The Opposite of Loneliness: Essays and Stories by Marina Keegan Page A

paused for a minute and looked down at our dog.
    “So your mother seems to think you and this Sam kid are awfully happy.” She must have brought it up.
    “Yeah,” I said. “We are.”
    “She said he bought you that necklace.” He gestured loosely at my neck.
    “Yeah. For Christmas.”
    He nodded, almost got up, but then stayed in his chair. “I thought that wind chime I got for her was good.” He looked up at me expectantly. It’s silver, my mom would have said. He bought her something silver.
    “No, it was.” I cleared my throat. “That was a really cool gift.”
    “I’m going to hang that up tomorrow.”
    I nodded this time. “Yeah, you totally should. That thing’s supposed to be cool.”
    “I’ll do that tomorrow,” he repeated, walking over to the sink.
    He didn’t. And by the time either of us woke up my mom’s banana bread was cold.
    Sam’s uncle had an annual New Year’s party in Canada, and in a gesture of romantic formality Sam suggested we dress up and drive there instead of getting drunk in someone’s basement. He showed me pictures from the previous year while we waited for our instant cookies to bake. Everyone was wearing suits and had champagne and he said that people were maybe going to go skiing the next day. I decided to spend some of my campus job money on a dress and went back to a store I’d seen in the Hammond Bay Galleria. I stood alone in a three-way mirror, unable to choose between a green and two blacks. So I angled the panels and took pictures of each on my phone, sending them one by one in texts to my mom. I had to call her twice to explain how to open them, but she’d said the green made my legs look good so I went with that.
    On the day Sam and I were supposed to leave, I found her again folding socks downstairs. I came in wearing the green dress to model it in person.
    “What do you think?” I said, spinning around.
    “You look beautiful,” she said. “He won’t be able to keep it on you.”
    “Mom, come on!” I laughed, turning around. “Can you unzip me?”
    She unzipped me and I went back upstairs to pack it away, returning in a pair of jeans and a gray sweater.
    “So you’re driving up tonight?”
    “This afternoon, yeah.” I reached my hand into the basket and started searching for a sock with two black stripes. “Don’t worry, I’m driving.”
    “Okay.”
    “Are you doing anything?”
    “Probably not.” She smiled. “I don’t really like New Year’s, it’s sort of an excuse to drink.”
    “Fair enough.” We didn’t say anything for a while, both absorbed in the sock pairings. “You know your father didn’t always drink like this, right?” She was looking right at me and I had to make eye contact.
    “I know,” I said. “He hasn’t been that bad while I’ve been home, actually. I sort of see him sometimes when you’re already asleep.”
    “That’s nice of you to say,” she said, this time not smiling. “I don’t know, Addie.” She let out a sigh. “I just don’t know.” I hated this kind of discussion and I hated myself for hating it. I wondered for a moment who else my mom might confide in but I wasn’t actually sure how close she was with any of her book-group friends. “I don’t know if I can do this anymore.” She was looking down again.
    “Yeah.”
    “Having you home, it made me think, and you seem so . . .”
    “I didn’t mean . . .” But I trailed off too. I wasn’t sure whether this was different.
    She paused. “Now that you guys are almost grown up, I’m not sure there’s a point.”
    “I don’t know.” It was a stupid response and I wasn’t sure if I should comfort her.
    There wasn’t sadness in her voice, just that same exhaustion I’d seen from my car. My phone vibrated and I flipped it open to a message from Sam.
    “You can take that if you want,” my mom said, looking down.
    “Oh, no, it’s fine, it’s not a call.”
    “A text message?” She took pride in knowing the